Prayer for children
We pray for children
who sneak Popsicles before supper,
who erase holes in math workbooks,
who can never find their shoes.
And we pray for those
who stare at photographers from behind barbed wire,
who can't bound down the street in a new pair of
sneakers,
who never go to the circus,
who live in an X-rated world.
We pray for children
who bring us sticky kisses and fistfuls of
dandelions,
who hug us in a hurry and forget their lunch money.
And we pray for those
who never get dessert,
who have no safe blanket to drag behind them,
who watch their parents watch them die,
who can't find any bread to steal,
who don't have any rooms to clean up,
whose pictures aren't on anybody's dresser,
whose monsters are real.
We pray for children
who spend all their allowance before Tuesday,
who throw tantrums in the grocery store and pick at their
food,
who like ghost stories,
who shove dirty clothes under the bed, and never rinse out
the tub,
who get visits from the tooth fairy,
who don't like to be kissed in front of the
carpool,
who squirm in church and scream into the phone,
whose tears we sometimes laugh at and whose smiles can make
us cry.
And we pray for those
whose nightmares come in the daytime,
who will eat anything,
who have never seen a dentist,
who aren't spoiled by anybody,
who go to bed hungry and cry themselves to sleep,
who live and move, but have no being.
We pray for children who want to be carried and for those who
must be.
For those we never give up on and for those who don't get a
second chance.
For those we smother... and for those
who will grab the hand of anyone kind enough to offer
it.
Ina J. Hughes
